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Cilyjr's 470 gallon display

Cilyjr

Cilyjr

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Tank stats
Display: 475 gallon custom Glasscages
120x36x25 with 2x synergy Reef Shadow V3
Sump: diy 75 gallon old fashioned sump
Frag: custom 35 gallon 48x20x10
Qt: 20g tall end of line quarantine
Lights: 10x reefi uno 2.1, 8x 54w t5
Return: 2x jebao dcw-8000
Flow: 6x vortech mp-40 1x Jebao MCP-180 laminar flow pump.
Supplementation: 1x avast kalk stirrer, 1x controlled 2 part dosing

The tank is on a stand I built in place and is good ol' fashioned wood. And is plumbed through the wall into a shed where the sump is.

It's been running since the 2nd week of October. Previous to that I had a 320 gallon 67x36x30 tank in its place. It had been there since 2023 which replaced a 120 I had since moving west.
 
I figured I'll do a bit about me in a 2nd post before getting to pictures and the build.

I moved across the country to California from Rhode Island in the summer of 2018. There I had set up my 1st saltwater aquarium in 1998 and then my 1st reef in 2004 and had been consistently running since then. The final Aquarium was 180 gallon that was built into the wall which existed there for about 10 years until I moved.

Back East I was part of the Boston Reefer society since 2006 and had been involved in leadership on one form or another for close to 10 years.

In 2018 I decided to move west and ended up on the California Central Coast. I am happy to be here, and California has been very good to me. I have zero regrets about moving. The one thing that I did find a little bit disappointing was the lack of an organized club here in the Central Coast, That's what led me to this club!

Anyway, let me get back to the build over the next few posts.
 
I had gotten to the point with my 320 gallon where I was feeling crowded. Seems crazy for that much volume but the tank was kind of a strange dimension being not quite 6 ft long and 30 in tall.
I have never been the kind of person that wanted multiple aquariums. I prefer to have one running well. I should say at least only one system. I don't want to have to do water changes in three different places etc.

Let me put in some progression pictures of the 320 before I start on the new aquarium.
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Getting back to the only wanting one aquarium. I decided I want to get the one that will be there indefinitely. So I decided to go as big as I possibly could for the space.

My wife and I sat around figuring out exactly what the maximum possible size would be for the space. Then, We swung into action

I talked to several manufacturers including Visio in Southern California, Planet Aquarium in Texas, and Joe at Glass Cages ages in Tennessee.

Visio was by far the cheapest but they wanted to put in four 20-in cross braces. They were also making the tank out of tempered 1/2-in glass and that did not seem good enough to me.

Planet Aquarium had a very hard time even getting back to me. To the point of where I never got a number from them even after a few weeks. I had called Ian directly who used to be his own manufacturer but recently switched to working with them. He was very nice and told me I needed to talk to the rep, The rep was pretty curt and though not rude, made it pretty clear. He wasn't interested in working with me. He only went through local fish stores. So I had my local fish store contact him. Then they never gave him a number.

Glass cages on the other hand was phenomenal to work with. Anytime I had a question, I would email them and somebody would get back to me a half an hour Even outside of business hours. At one point he had an email chain that was over 50 emails. Not only that if I called I spoke to a person directly and if I had a more complicated question they would schedule a call and Joe would call me back usually within an hour. I am not a rich person just a passionate hobbyist. Joe, definitely understood that and made me feel like my money was being well spent. Hopefully I won't be buying another aquarium but if I do it will absolutely be a glass cages.

I was told it would take 6 to 8 weeks to build the aquarium. So then the fun began
 
Kensington Reefer said:
What is the state of that 320?
Those dimensions are amazing...chunky with a great footprint
And 30” high...awesome sauce
Click to expand...
No way dude, the 25 in is the best. My sleeves have not been soaking wet since October!

The tank is going to the high school in Cambria probably next week.

A friend of mine runs a program there trying to get the kids interested in Coral restoration, etc
 
These were some of the colonies that came out.
Although I could find no visible signs of acropora eating flatworms or any other pasts, I decided everything should go through a potassium chloride dip before it went into the holding system.

Sadly most of the large colonies did not survive. Well, I should not say they didn't survive. I have pieces of pretty much everything but nothing over 5 in did well as they were in the holding system for about 2 and 1/2 months.
Weirdly all of the fish did great, that is until they went back into the 470 but more on that later.
 
Ok out! Now the building can start.
I ended up going with good old-fashioned wood due to the fact that I'm a fairly competent woodworker and doing steel was going to cost about $2,000 plus all of the skinning. Since the only thing going underneath my tank is storage. It didn't matter to me having to put in extra bracing. I built the entire stand for about 600 bucks.
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I used a a 20L to level the tank because I cannot keep a level. And not manage to not knock the bead off level a little bit
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Cilyjr said:
No way dude, the 25 in is the best. My sleeves have not been soaking wet since October!

The tank is going to the high school in Cambria probably next week.

A friend of mine runs a program there trying to get the kids interested in Coral restoration, etc
Click to expand...
Lucky school!

The fish tell me 30” is better!
They don’t like bumping their heads swimming over the reef!
I’m vertically challenged and used to think 24” was ideal, but after having had larger fish I’ve gained a different perspective.
And once the sand goes in, it’s less than 30” already
And ya can get a tool for the windows

But, hey, that’s just me, from way up here
It’s your thang, do what cha wanna do!
We’re here to help
 
I did not do much to the shed. It's been there since I put in the 120. But I did need to move the baffles in the sump. I also did some cable management using 3d printed multi board.
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I also needed to make more room as I added and return pump and 3 more drains for a total of 6 1.5 drains and 2 3/4 returns.
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There is a 2 foot gap between the shed and house that's where my fresh water lives.
There's a hose so I can get water easily. The giant elephant ear kind of hides it when sitting on that patio
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Oh the lights I forgot about that. I like the look of a floating canopy.
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I had 6 reefi uno 2.1 in my 320 and am happy with them, I added 4 more. I'll probably never run LED without t-5 so I had to make room for all of that.
I used solar mounting rails to mount my lights. I just printed a bracket and it worked great.
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Kensington Reefer said:
@Cilyjr
Standing on chair, clapping!
Click to expand...
Thanks, a lot of thought went into this build. I tried to take a little piece of every mistake that I could remember making and made an attempt to correct it...

Back to the depth of the aquarium. I could not reach the back bottom of the 320 and that caused me a lot of issues. I knew that was going to be compounded with the 10-ft length. I needed to make sure I could reach the back bottom in the middle areas as I do not have access to the back of the aquarium from another room. That was the deciding factor.
 
Cilyjr said:
Thanks, a lot of thought went into this build. I tried to take a little piece of every mistake that I could remember making and made an attempt to correct it...

Back to the depth of the aquarium. I could not reach the back bottom of the 320 and that caused me a lot of issues. I knew that was going to be compounded with the 10-ft length. I needed to make sure I could reach the back bottom in the middle areas as I do not have access to the back of the aquarium from another room. That was the deciding factor.
Click to expand...
Riding along...
 
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